The general scheme is set forth clearly in the plan, and it may be said that at the very beginning it was determined the men should be housed in smaller units than was usual. There are four cell blocks of three tiers each, all with outside cells, there being 27 men on a floor and 81 to a cell block. The connecting corridor 16 feet wide runs approximately east and west, and to this are joined the four cell blocks on the south, and on the north the reception building, the refectory, and school building. Between the two central cell blocks is placed the administration building, connected to them by an open passage.
The administration building has on the ground floor the warden’s office on one side of the hall, and the clerical office on the other, and in the rear, a long corridor which has been called the “guards’ corridor” but which will be used largely for the intercourse between the prisoners and the public. On the second floor of the administration building are quarters for a hospital and some rooms for the officers. It will be noted that the officers’ rooms on the second floor and the guards’ rooms on the third floor are accessible from the public space, but the hospital is accessible only from the prison side. In other words, the hospital is in the fortified portion and the guards’ quarters in the unfortified. The main stairway goes up to the third floor of the administration building, devoted entirely to guards’ rooms, and these were made large enough so that two guards could occupy one room, and while this is not generally advisable it was a wise forethought because some of the rooms have already been used in this way.
Hospital and Reception Building
The hospital quarters are small, because in the prison with the individual room a man who is sick is better off in his cell than he would be in a general hospital ward, and the men very frequently prefer to stay by themselves.
The prisoners brought to the institution enter the bath and reception building at the rear, where the process of their reception is as follows:
ADMINISTRATION BUILDING—ENTRANCE SIDE
They enter to the left, where they undress and bathe. Their clothes are tied up in a bag, temporarily placed in a metal-lined closet, which can be fumigated, and later taken to the general county farm laundry and sterilized. After the prisoner has had his bath he goes into the doctor’s office, where he is given a careful physical examination, and here also are made the finger-print and other records of identification which are very desirable from many points of view.
He then goes to the barber if necessary and has his hair cut. It is not now the custom to crop all prisoners’ heads unless the actual physical condition makes such treatment necessary. After he has been given clean underclothes and a clean prison suit he goes to the warden’s office and is there interviewed by him. The prisoner is told what the rules of the institution are, and his first meeting with the warden is of consequence to both, as it gives the warden an intimate opportunity to regard and to counsel his man, and the prisoner his first intimation of what is expected of him and what his treatment will be. After his interview with the warden the prisoner is placed in cell block 3 to stay during the period of observation, which is usually about two weeks. This is not only for the purpose of finding out what his physical condition may be, and to guard against the development of contagious disease, but also that the prison authorities may make the equally important diagnosis of his mentality, from which is largely determined his future treatment.